2021 North Shore Triathlon

The end of 2021 has become a whirlwind of racing and life in general. That being said, these next few race reports may be lacking the level of detail you have come to expect from me.

On October 11, 2021 I race the North Shore Triathlon (Sprint).

I got up super early to make the drive to North Vancouver. After finding parking and grabbing all my gear, I made my way to transition.

I picked a spot near what looked like bike in/out. After carefully setting up my transition area, I took a walk around the pool building to try and scope out what transition would be like. 

I found the finish line around the back and then found the route from the pool to transition. It was on a trail up a hill. As soon as my mind thought, "That will kill our feet!" I saw volunteers laying a carpet down the hill. Whew!

After a last minute trip to the washroom, all the athletes waited in the parking lot for their starts to be called. There was some confusion as the race announcer was just saying "Ok, if you are in the fast group, head inside!" Well, what was the fast group? What are the times? Everyone in the parking lot looked to have the same questions. I walked up to the race announcer and asked if he could call out times too. After that, the call outs went smoother. 

I decided to seed myself in the front of the 10:00-10:30 minute group. The swim was only 444 meters (weird pool size I know). My group was called, and we headed inside. We took off our warm layer of clothes, put it in our drop off bag, and lined up. We all self-seeded based on our times. 

They let us out of our holding area 8 at a time. We went back outside and in through another door right into the pool area. We lined up against a wall and waited for out start. 

The Swim

After dropping our masks into the trash, we would wait for the official, drop in, and go. 

The official warned me that the water was shallow. I dropped in not realizing it was only 2 feet deep. This threw me off and I did not get a good push off the wall. 

Another wrench in the works was that the shallow side was the same side where you swam under the ropes to enter the next lane. Usually (like at UBC) I would push off the wall and go under the ropes on the push off. But the water was so shallow, I could never get the timing right. 

As I continued on the swim, I ended up passing several people. I was careful to only pass at the wall, or if no one was coming the other way. I even had to dodge head on collisions from a few swimmers going the wrong way. 

I should have have seeded myself in the wave ahead of me. And based on the number of people I was passing, some of them should have seeded differently too. But this is how it goes with a pool swim. I did my best not to get frustrated and just kept swimming. 

At the last length, I was going to pass the swimmer in front of me but then changed my mind. The effort put forth in a surge for the last 30 meters would not be worth it. I knew I'd have to truck up a hill in the October cold once out of the pool. So I just drafted until the end of the swim. 

I climbed up the steps and made my way out of the pool area and outside. It was cold. I went up the hill, found my bike and took my time drying off. 

I had packed a pair of thermal leggings and a thermal long-sleeved, but opted for just arm warmers instead. The main reason being I just didn't want to deal with putting all that on. And if I got hot, they are not easily removed. 

I took my time getting ready for the bike and it was soon time to go. 

The Bike

The start of the bike was a gradual uphill to the main road. The bike was feeling sluggish and I could not tell if it was me, the hill, or a flat tire. I jumped off the bike and checked. Nope, tire was good, let's get it! 

After a right turn onto the main road I enjoyed a slight downhill. This was short lived however as a climb started soon after. I could see by my power numbers that I was pushing too hard, too soon. I reigned it in and continued on.

The first lap of the 4 lap course was all about easing in and reconnaissance. During the second lap I continued to take it easy on the climbs, but laid the power down on the descents. Lap 3 and 4 got even faster respectively. I spent more and more time on the aero bars as the race went on. 

Soon, I was turning left to head back to transition and start the run.

The Run

The run started out on a nice trail through a wooded area. I was able to hold an ok pace until the trail started going uphill toward the road. I walked up the hill, but started to run again once I hit the road. 

I ran on the main road (the same as the bike) for a bit until the course took me into a local neighborhood. Then it was back on the main road for an out-and-back.

I was running up and down the same hills I had previously cycled on and did my best to hold pace going up. By the end, I was walking up the hills and running down them.

When I reached the top of the last hill, I upped my pace, knowing that I was almost done.

I ran past transition and back into to wooded area at the start of the run. I picked up even more speed now as I could hear the sounds of the finish line. Maybe a little too much speed as I tripped and almost bailed on a tree root. Luckily I was able to steady myself and continue on to the finish. 

This was yet another race I normally do not get to do because of work. Yet another reason I am glad I switched companies. For the amount of training I was able (or not able) to do, I feel good about my performance and hope do this again in the future. 

Swim:   00:09:48 (0.44k) 

Bike:     00:48:14 (17.6k)

Run:     00:42:54 (5k)

Total:    01:40:56